Mrs Jordan's Profession
Page 42
30. George Munster to Minney Dawson-Damer, 22 June 1837, quoted in S. Leslie, The Letters of Mrs Fitzherbert (1940), p. 321. George says the picture is in the possession of his younger brother Augustus, so presumably it went to Mapledurham. He mentions ‘water-colour drawings’ of himself, and one of Henry by ‘Eldridge’ (presumably Edridge); and also says he has taken ‘two seals of my poor mother… with which she has often sealed hundreds of letters to me full of that entire affection and excellent feeling she so greatly possessed’.
31. Amelia had one son who died childless, Mary no children. Sophy died in childbirth in 1837, leaving five children, and her descendants are still at Penshurst Place. Eliza and Augusta also have many descendants; and Eliza’s grandson married into the legitimate royal family in 1889 when he became the husband of Queen Victoria’s granddaughter, Princess Louise, and was created first Duke of Fife. See Family Trees.
32. Percy Fitzgerald, The Life and Times of King William IV, vol. 1 (1884), p. 121. The royal family was embarrassed throughout the century by a situation that paralleled that of Mrs Jordan and William in the next generation. Prince George, cousin of Queen Victoria, and considered a possible husband for her, fell in love with another theatrical figure, the dancer Louisa Fairbrother, fathered three sons on her, married her – unconstitutionally, but otherwise correctly – and lived with her in Queen Street, Mayfair, until her death. The Fairbrothers were a theatre clan: Robert Fairbrother was Sheridan’s servant, another Robert was prompter at Drury Lane, Samuel Fairbrother printed playbills. Louisa, born in 1814 (and christened Sarah), started dancing at sixteen, gave birth to two children by Charles Manners Sutton, grandson of the Archbishop of Canterbury, and continued her career. She met Prince George after a command performance on the evening of the Queen’s wedding in 1840. George’s closest friend was his older cousin Lord Adolphus FitzClarence, and they shared a passion for the theatre. Many efforts were made to break up the relationship between George and Louisa; he was sent to Corfu in the summer of 1843, just as she gave birth to their first child, another George. She returned to the stage but as soon as he was back in England they resumed their affair, and in January 1846 she bore another son, Adolphus. A year later she was pregnant again, and she and George were married at St John’s, Clerkenwell. So Louisa achieved respectability, but she paid a price. Obliged to give up the stage, she found life empty: and she was never accepted by any of her husband’s family, so that he lived a double life, attending state occasions and visiting the Queen as a bachelor, and sometimes lectured on his morals by Albert. George was a kindly man and enjoyed domestic life; he was good to Louisa’s two elder children, who called him Papa, and put the boy into the army, as he did his own sons. Louisa was sometimes jealous, both of his royal duties and his wandering eye. She complained that the Queen was always sending for him just when she wanted him at home; but as the years went by she gradually accepted her shadowy half-life as ‘Mrs FitzGeorge’, and his regular departures for shooting parties and royal holidays in Germany without her. He succeeded his father as second Duke of Cambridge in 1850; six years later he was appointed commander-in-chief of the army. In the same year he paid his first visit to Balmoral, and suffered the death of his dearest friend, Adolphus FitzClarence. In this year also Louisa made a last attempt to get permission to take part in a play. He wrote to her, ‘As regards the question you put to me about your taking part in some private theatricals, I never thought darling that you put that question to me seriously, but now that I find you do, I must confess that I have a very great objection to it and hope you will not do so.’
1. In 1878, when the FitzGeorge sons were all in their thirties, George’s mother, the old Duchess – now eighty-one – asked to meet her grandsons for the first time. She found them charming, and they continued to visit her regularly at St James’s, without their mother of course. Mrs FitzGeorge died in Queen Street in 1890, unacknowledged by her husband’s family, although Queen Victoria wrote a note of sympathy to George after her death, ‘which would have been such a joy to my beloved one, had she known the fact,’ he wrote in his diary.
22 THE STATUE’S STORY: 1830–1980
1. The DNB says it was at Mapledurham Church in 1851. In 1913 Philip Sergeant wrote (Mrs Jordan, Child of Nature, p. 329), ‘after his [WIV’s] death next year it was taken down to the Rev. Lord Augustus FitzClarence’s rectory at Mapledurham and forgotten’. Harold Armitage’s book on Chantrey, published in 1915, also mentions ‘the monument of Mrs Jordan that may be seen now in the church at Mapledurham in Oxfordshire’ (p. 86). Neither the parish nor the bishop’s archives has any record of it being there, nor do any of the local people have any recollection of it. Lord Augustus’s widow left Mapledurham after his death in 1854; the church was heavily restored and altered in the 1860s by Butterfield, and it seems likely the statue would have remained in situ during these operations. Clare Jerrold (The Story of Dorothy Jordan) in 1914 says it ‘was for a considerable time at Mapledurham’ and that although it ‘had to go begging for a resting place in earlier days [it] now holds an honoured place in the house of the present Earl of Munster’: perhaps Sergeant’s reference spurred him to collect the statue from wherever it was being kept. This was the fourth Earl, Aubrey, who succeeded in 1902, aged forty, lived in London, and died 1 January 1928; he also visited Dora’s grave at Saint-Cloud and had it put into good order. Jerrold obviously saw the statue – she shows a photograph of it – and says there was no inscription on it.
2. Mapledurham Church was restored and enlarged by Butterfield in the 1860s under the Revd Ernest Coleridge, who officiated from 1862 to 1883, so that it looks quite different from the church over which Augustus presided; and the statue may have been moved out during the building work.
3. Miss Mary Birkbeck, niece of the fifth Earl, remembers clearly seeing it on the ‘stoep’ – the Earl’s word for the veranda, because he had been brought up in South Africa – and the excitement of its arrival some time in the 1950s.
4. Joseph Fisher, Etched Reminiscences (1847).
5. It also has the modello for the statue, a very interesting piece. The whole story of the Chantrey plasters is told by Nicholas Penny in ‘Chantrey, Westmacott and Casts after the Antique’ in the Journal of the History of Collections, vol. 3, no. 2 (1991), pp. 255–64. The curator responsible for the destruction was E. T. Leeds; curiously, he was an archaeologist.
6. Information from John Kenworthy-Browne, who inspected it.
7. The Earls of Munster were (1) George (2) his son William, who married a first cousin, Wilhelmina, daughter of Augusta (3) their third son Geoffrey, who died without issue (4) their fifth son Aubrey, who died without issue (5) his nephew, son of William and Wilhelmina’s seventh son, another Geoffrey but always known as Boy, also childless (6) Edward Charles (a grandson of the second Earl’s younger brother George) and (7) his son, the present Earl, Anthony Charles, who is the seventh and last, having no male heir; nor do there appear to be any male descendants of Frederick or Augustus FitzClarence.
APPENDIX
1. John Genest, Some Account of the English Stage from the Restor in 1660 to 1830, vol. 6 (1832), p. 382. Genest also notes Cibber spelt his heroine’s name ‘Hypolita’, which Drury Lane amended to ‘Hippolita’, on its playbill of 1 January 1787 (Some Account…, vol. 7, p. 241). Confusion has reigned ever since.
2. James Boaden, The Life of Mrs Jordan, vol. 2 (1831), pp. 67–8.
3. Horace Walpole to Lady Ossory, W. S. Lewis (ed.), The Correspondence of Horace Walpole, vol. 34 (1965), p. 51.
Acknowledgements
By gracious permission of Her Majesty the Queen I have been allowed free access to all the material in the Royal Archives at Windsor and permission to reproduce certain pictures from the Royal Collection.
I was fortunate in having the help of Lady de Bellaigue, Registrar of the Royal Archives, at many points, including the deciphering of some difficult readings of Mrs Jordan’s hand, and should like to express my particular sense of
indebtedness to her for her meticulous checking; also to all her staff.
I am grateful to the Huntington Library, San Marino, California, and its Curator, Sara S. Hodson, for providing me with microfilms of its collection of Mrs Jordan’s letters, and for permission to reproduce extracts from them. My warm thanks also to Judith Flanders for finding me a microfilm reader which enabled me to study the Huntington letters at my own pace at home.
I have met with much kindness while working on this book. Among the living descendants of Mrs Jordan, the present Earl of Munster was the first to give me advice and assistance. Mr J.U.C. Birkbeck and Miss Mary Birkbeck, Viscount De L’Isle and Viscount Falkland were all generous with their time and in showing me papers, letters, pictures and memorabilia. Mr Birkbeck has allowed me to reproduce from family papers, and I have also been granted permission to reproduce from the De L’Isle Manuscripts, a private family archive held at Maidstone in Kent. Others who prefer not to be named have also offered me substantial help, which is by no means forgotten.
Sir Brinsley Ford generously allowed me to study his family papers and pictures and to take copies and photographs of them. General Sir Victor FitzGeorge-Balfour gave me more than the usual assistance by allowing me to take away his family papers to study and copy. Dr P.B. Clapham, Director of the National Physical Laboratory, together with Mrs Clapham, took me into every corner of Bushy House from cellar to attic to garden, instructed me in its history, located pictures and entered enthusiastically into my interest. Dr Nicholas Penny led me to the hitherto unknown Beechey portrait of Mrs Jordan as Rosalind, and gave me the extraordinary story of the destruction of Chantrey’s casts. Christopher Lloyd, Surveyor of the Queen’s Pictures, offered much useful information and took me to see Chantrey’s statue and Hoppner’s allegorical painting; and the Hon. Mrs Jane Roberts, Curator of the Print Room, Windsor Castle, also went to considerable trouble on my behalf. I had kind help from the Rt. Hon. Sir Robert Fellowes, Keeper of the Queen’s Archives, and from Sir Oliver Millar.
Susan Palmer, Archivist at Sir John Soane’s Museum, was exceptionally helpful, as was Jonathan Franklin at the National Portrait Gallery Archive. Nicholas Savage and the staff of the Library of the Royal Academy; Janet Birkett of the Theatre Museum; Ian Dejardin, Curator at Kenwood; Norman Fenner of Richmond Theatre and Richard Mangan of the Raymond Mander & Jo Mitchenson Collection all gave me substantial assistance.
I should also like to thank Dr Mary Beal of the Government Art Collection; Dr John Whiteley of the Ashmolean Print Room; the Very Reverend Michael Mayne, Dean of Westminster; Mr Jo Wisdom of the Library of St Paul’s Cathedral; Miss Betty Beesley, Secretary to the Works of Art Committee of the Garrick Club Collection; Roger Beacham of Cheltenham Public Library; Brian Allen and Elizabeth A. Powis at the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art; Rosamund Griffin, Keeper of the Collection at Waddesdon Manor; the Municipal Archivist of Saint-Cloud; David Learmont of the National Trust of Scotland; Betty Muirden of the Yale Center for British Art; Michael Roberts and the Hon. Georgina Stonor at Brooks’s Club; Kay Mowlam of Sotheby’s; Oliver Cyzer and Paul Obrey of Christie’s; Iris Rhodes of Gallery 90, Guildford; Joy Ashby, Curator of Fenton House for the National Trust; G.W. Oxley, Archivist for Hull City Council; Brian Dyson, Archivist at the University of Hull; Miss M.J. Swarbrick, Chief Archivist to the City of Westminster; and Mark Ballard of the Centre for Kentish Studies, Maidstone. In New York, Kristine Puopolo kindly sought out the death notice of Fanny Alsop for me.
The British Library was, as always, both haven and place of discovery, its staff unfailingly helpful. The same is true of the London Library. Humberside Libraries were also of assistance.
Mary Kift provided me with much information about Mapledurham and Augustus FitzClarence. Richard Holmes assisted me greatly in investigating Coleridge’s interest in Mrs Jordan. Dr Christopher Mallinson and Dr Michael Price both devoted much time and thought to considering her symptoms and final illness. Christopher Bland sent me a useful stack of information relating to the earlier generations of the Bland family. Mr Francis Atkins, Churchwarden Emeritus of St Mary the Virgin, Hampton, was a wonderful source of information both about the church where George Munster is buried and the general history of the area. Professor Harold Tedford shared his knowledge and enthusiasm for Mrs Jordan with me; and the expertise of Diana B. Joll enabled her to establish the name of her silhouettist for me.
Jill Grey did some brilliant research and also located copies of rare books for me. I had help too from Philip Ziegler, Flora Fraser, Tom Pocock, John Carey, Graham Storey, John Hayes, Robert Holden, Alan Cowie, John Kenworthy-Browne, David Mannings, Marie Cooper, Messrs Dorling Kindersley, Richard Chapman, John Wilson, Aileen Ribeiro, Peter Holland and the late R.L. Bayne-Powell.
Both my English and American editors, Tony Lacey and Charles Elliott, have made substantial suggestions for improving the text for which I am grateful, as I am to Donna Poppy; this is the third of my books to be copy-edited by her, and to owe much to her scrupulousness and eye for detail.
My husband has shown patience and forbearance with my obsession with Dora Jordan’s history, which has taken several years to unravel. While busy with his own writing, he cheered me through bad patches, shared my jubilation over discoveries of letters and pictures, and gave excellent advice at all times.
The paperback edition incorporates some new material.
Peter B. S. Davies and David W. James, both of St David’s, Pembrokeshire, have generously shared with me their discoveries relating to Mrs Jordan’s mother and her Welsh family.
Diana Daniell showed me her precious collection of letters written by the FitzClarence children to her great-great-great-uncle James William Daniell, tutor to the boys at Bushy, who remained on friendly terms with them until their and his deaths in the mid-1850s.
Philip Jones of Ewell drew my attention to the parish register held in the Surrey Record Office in which are entered the baptisms of Mrs Jordan’s daughter Lucy Hester (Ford) in August 1792 and her son George FitzClarence in May 1794.
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First published by Viking 1994
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Copyright © Claire Tomalin, 1994, 1995
Front cover: Portrait © English Heritage Photo Library/ The Bridgeman Art Library.
Illustration © Courtesy of the Warden and Scholars of New College, Oxford/ The Bridgeman Art Library
Mrs. Jordan's Profession: Front cover: Portrait © English Heritage Photo Library/ The Bridgeman Art Library. Illustration © Courtesy of the Warden and Scholars of New College, Oxford/ The Bridgeman Art Library
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ISBN: 978-0-14-193319-1
* Kitty Clive, born in 1711, was still alive when Dora arrived in London, but no longer in Henrietta Street. She moved on her retirement in 1769 to a house on Strawberry Hill offered to her by Horace Walpole who, like Dr Johnson, was a close friend. She had been briefly married to a lawyer, but separated from him and lived with her brother. Generous and modest, she was a leading actress at Drury Lane from 1728, and excelled in what was called ‘low comedy’; she also wrote several farces. She died in December 1785, three months after Dora’s first appearance at her old theatre. Macklin founded the Coffee House in the 1750s, and left it when he became bankrupt. An Irish actor and playwright, he was best known for his performance as Shylock, for his comedy, The Man of the World, and for his violent temper.